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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]the legacy status did help. sorry. if your kid doesn't like encountering this attitude, he should apply to some places regular decision where he doesn't have any family or donor ties.[/quote]
Meh it’s about respect. If friend delivered the qualifier in a non bitter way, then sure following with “yeah that’s probably it” is a good way to respond. If friend made bitter snipe, then they can get an appropriate response that bitter snipe deserves. There a lot of nuance in how this conversation goes. No one has to suffer bitter comments from bitter people.[/quote]

It’s not a “bitter snipe” to say something like “Yeah, your parents went there.” That is simply pointing out reality.

Frankly, I think admissions boosts are something that should be openly discussed and acknowledged. It is harmful across the board to pretend that admissions is a level playing field. That myth and the fierce perpetuation of that myth is deeply undemocratic and destructive. [/quote]
Well we don’t know how it was delivered. That’s why it’s important to give extra context about an appropriate response. Only the people in that conversation can know, but I can definitely see how it could have been a dig… or not. [/quote]

OMG “yeah, your parents went there” cannot be a dig in any rational world.

You people and your demands that your children never learn the truth about the advantages of legacy admissions are genuinely crazy. [/quote]
Parents cannot admit it is why their kid was admitted. Surely he was a competitive applicant and would have gotten in anyhow. How dare you suggest otherwise![/quote]

Yes, the ego conflation the legacy parents in this thread have with their kids is quite something to see. [/quote]

Meh, sounds more like sour grapes from the non-legacy parents to me.

It's a game and some people know how to play it. Why wouldn't you encourage your kid to apply to your Alma mater if legacy preference helps them get in?!?!

College admission is not a meritocracy, and no college claims that it is. "Holistic admission" is code for "we get to admit whomever we want for whatever reason.
 
Kids and parents should be spending time finding their own "hooks" (and there are plenty to choose from!) instead of kicking this dead horse. [/quote]

Nobody objects to legacy parents using their significant advantages for their kids, for schools where those advantages exist. What people object to are the demands from legacy parents that everyone else must pretend that legacy kids don’t have a significant advantage, and that their kids never, ever hear that they got admitted because of legacy preference.

It’s the demands from the legacy parents to hide reality and to pretend the playing field is level that are objectionable. You know your kid got in because of legacy. We know your kid got in because of legacy. Other kids know your kid got in because of legacy. Everyone who knows you went to the school except for your own kid knows your kid got in because of legacy. But you want everyone to be as silent as the grave about that reality we all know exists, so your own kid never has to confront the reality everybody else knows exists.

It’s entitled and ridiculous behavior. [/quote]
If everyone knows then why are we even talking about it? Why do they have to be ‘confronted?’ People who need to ‘confront’ others over their admissions may need to take some time to focus on their own admissions.[/quote]

Your kids don’t know, because you desperately hide the truth from them. You tell them they would have gotten in without legacy, and you lash out at children who point out even mildly that their parents went to the same school. Even framing a basic fact as “confronting” just shows how weirdly desperate you are to suppress the truth.

Why are you so desperate to control what everyone says about this? Why can’t you tell your children the truth, which is that they had significantly better odds than other kids by virtue of who their parents are?

This is one area where athlete parents and kids are so much more honest, and I respect it even if my kid doesn’t benefit. I rarely run into athlete parents who demand that everyone pretend their kid had no admissions advantages. But legacy parents will go out of their way to demand their kid had no or little advantage from legacy status, even in the face of extensive hard data showing otherwise. Faculty parents are the same, desperate to pretend their kids would have been admitted absent faculty status when that’s clearly not true based on the now-public data.

It is weird and entitled behavior, and this thread and the behavior of the legacy parents in it is just a microcosm of what happens more broadly. 
[/quote]
No one is lashing out. The PP used ‘confront’ which is an odd and slightly aggressive word to describe a simple comment. Either the comment was said in passing or said as a dig. OP makes it sound like it was a dig. The appropriate response would be to acknowledge the passing comment or treat the dig appropriately. You seem bothered by someone pushing back at the comment presented as a dig like they should just be gracious when insulted. Nope.

Good luck with admissions.[/quote]

OP is clearly lashing out. She’s on here, asking what her nearly-adult child should do, because some other kid correctly observed to her kid that his parents went to the school and possibly implied (also correctly) that the legacy status helped with admissions.

Maybe crashing out rather than lashing out is the better description, but you should not pretend this is healthy or normal behavior from OP, even if the legacy parents on this thread think it is.

It is not good behavior to demand that your child never hear so much as a whisper about how his legacy status was a significant boost in his admissions. In fact, that is quite objectively terrible behavior. [/quote]

+1 And frankly there was an option for OP's student to apply and not use their legacy status in their application, if there was a significant worry about being unfairly characterized as having had an admissions advantage that was the path to take.  Everyone, including OP and her kid, understands why they didn't do that . . . . [/quote]

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